The Last KBot
by Marvin Morrison
Summary: Following the destruction of the last Arm Commander a construction Kbot pilot awakens to find himself the last hope for purely biological human life.
1. Preface

Author's Preface

Because of the nature of this story and how I will be writing it I thought a preface of sorts necessary. This story has its beginnings a long time ago (I don't think I have that version anymore, but it might be somewhere, and if you happened to read TA fanfiction around that time this story will be very familiar), but I'm bringing it back because I enjoy it. That is the primary focus of the writing of this story, my enjoyment and betterment. As such it will be at my pace, in my way. I plan to do small 500 word chunks so that I can slowly go back through and edit it while continuing to write more. I will perhaps create larger chapters as I edit through stuff, but I'm not sure on that. Now, separate messages for separate groups of people.

TA Fans

For those of you who play and love Total Annihilation there are some parts of this story you may not like. I am not devoted to "canon" and I will take license with story elements, units, etc. It is based on Total Annihilation as you will see, but I am fleshing it out as I see necessary. I will also be attempting to write this story so that someone who has never played Total Annihilation will still understand, so I will be explaining things you may know better than I do. This seems especially necessary since the TA fanfiction scene looks to be dead or dormant at this point, so most of my readers will probably be friends looking for a good story, not a video game.

A couple specific things of note for you guys: I am ignoring Core Contingency because I think that story line was fairly weak, but I will probably still use the units from CC. I may work them in as 'new developments' or I may just use them like they've been around, not sure yet. This story is based on the original campaign with the outcome of the Core side. Beyond that, just read the story.

The Uninitiated (those of you who have never played TA)

My goal with this story is to make everything understandable for you apart from the game. Those who have played it will perhaps understand "better" because they have a way to visualize much of what I'm talking about, but you shouldn't have to go play to understand what I'm talking about. If you ever feel lost or like you don't understand, feel free to say something (either directly to me or in a review). As I mentioned above I'll be editing as I go along, so I can go back and put in extra details if necessary, but I've played so much TA I may not notice those details, so I need your help. Above all I want you to enjoy the story, though, so let me know if that isn't happening, too.

That's all, now for the prologue.


	2. Prologue

Prologue

Part 1

A war lasting for over 4000 years. No one could have imagined it, but the forces of the Arm and Core had actually lived it. The full beginnings of the war had been lost to time and simplified down to the conflict over artificial consciousness. Core scientists, back when neither Arm nor Core existed and the galaxy was united, discovered a way to transfer a person's consciousness into a machine, making them immortal. At first this process was optional, and those who had already embraced bionic implants to extend their lifespan also leapt at this opportunity. But those who held on tightly to natural biology resisted this as well.

At some point for now unknown reasons the government began requiring 'patterning' for all citizens. It was then that armed conflict began, but at first it was very peripheral and both sides figured that the outcome would be evident quickly. When the Core forces realized that their patterns were extremely easy to copy they lost the fear of death, because death was not final so long as the mainframe that housed their primary copy existed, and they began throwing themselves at the resistance forces.

Resistance on world after world was crushed by overwhelming numbers and so the then spread out resistance switched to guerilla warfare. Many of the original mainframes were destroyed before the Core forces began heavily guarding them, wiping out large swathes of the population. Unfortunately for the small resistance those mainframes did not contain the military personnel or the scientists that developed weapons. A new strategy would be necessary.

United in a small 'arm' of the galaxy, on a world called Empyrean the resistance regrouped and began to strategize. They would not become their enemies, but they needed a way to counter the Core's ability to make copy after copy of people and throw them at Arm forces. The solution they came to was cloning. Normal reproduction continued as well, but the military forces of the Arm were mainly made up of clones and simple artificial intelligence programs that could be directed by human commanders as necessary.

Part 2

The immediate transportation of Galactic Gates was still in its infancy when this conflict began, which is what gave the Arm forces time to regroup and strike back. Traditional means of space travel were necessary to travel between worlds and solar systems, so the spread of both forces was not quick. But as the conflict continued many worlds were mined and then abandoned, and the few still valuable worlds were connected through chains of Galactic Gates.

The immense amount of power necessary for a transfer in that way made it necessary to develop a single unit capable of establishing a base quickly. As such both sides developed large 'Commander' units which carried with them the plans to construct what was necessary. The Core Commanders traveled with stripped down patterns with just the necessary intelligence to follow orders, the Arm relied more heavily on their artificial intelligence units.

During the course of the conflict the Core had created its own base world, rather than using an already existing world. They combined the metal stripped from hundreds of worlds into a gigantic ball of metal on which they based their mainframes. The Arm continued to use Empyrean, a lush world filled with the kind of biological life they were fighting to save.

The conflict took place on outlying worlds, never piercing the defense networks of those base worlds. Never, that is, until the end of the conflict. Arm forces managed to penetrate to Core Prime itself, but they were to discover that this merely woke a sleeping beast. Greatly angered, the only Core Commander at that time pushed back, using the immense resources of Core Prime to begin the thrust and not losing momentum through the sequence of worlds he conquered on his way to Empyrean.

The Arm was well established on Empyrean, but they had never planned to fight a major war on their home world so they were not prepared for the Core Commander's onslaught. The last Arm Commander fought valiantly, but in the end he was defeated and destroyed. After over 4000 years of fighting the Core had finally won. The so called 'Arm' had been defeated and the reconstruction of society could begin even while a limited number of Core forces remained on Empyrean to clean up any remaining forces.

It was into this that Adam 32560 awoke, the last K-bot pilot.

A/N – After consultation with my sister, I decided to combine the "parts" into a single chapter so that after the editing process I can really combine it all without losing reviews. So I'll be updating chapters frequently and changing chapters less frequently.


	3. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Part 1

Adam 32560 slowly opened his eyes, and then closed them again. Then he opened them more quickly. He was actually still alive. How could that be? He had watched as the Core Commander destroyed the last Arm Commander. Surely they must have destroyed all the Arm units by now.

Perhaps his Construction K-Bot was so far gone that it had been passed over. He had been buffeted by enough explosions there at the end that he would not be surprised. He flicked a switch and the systems lights all came on properly.

Construction K-Bots had been designed as low level construction units. The plans they had were slightly more advanced than the Commander's (since he was designed to get a base going from nothing) but the nano-lathe used to construct buildings from small nano-bots was much less efficient. However, as Adam suddenly remembered, this was not quite a normal K-Bot.

Commanders took a large amount of resources, too much to be building them as the Core was pressing their advantage. Instead, a new experimental construction K-bot was designed, with some of the features of the commander. It had limited self-repair ability and a very small radar as well. Adam's unit must have been damaged enough that the Core units passed it by and then the self-repair feature took over bringing things back online.

But the self-repair feature was extremely slow, which meant that…Adam was shocked to see that a week had passed since the destruction of the last Arm Commander. He didn't know what had happened to him, but his survival instinct immediately took over. If he was the last human left he had to try and survive.

But there was no way. How could a single K-bot survive on a planet completely conquered by the Core? His only chance was to hide, which was next to impossible. In spite of that conclusion he flipped on his radar and checked to see if anything was moving nearby. There was nothing.

He stopped to think about his options. He remembered a rumor about a valley that did weird things to radar. That wouldn't stop sight, but it might buy him a little time. That was to the west, a few miles, past the wreckage of the Arm base and into the forest a little ways. But he would have to pass through the open spaces of the base.

Flipping on the external cameras he took a look at the outside of his K-bot. It looked pretty beat up, and might be taken for wreckage as long as it wasn't giving off energy signals like an active unit. At night his heat signature would give him away, so he decided to risk daytime movement, going extremely slowly.

Once his plan was set he focused down as he had been trained and nothing else mattered. He sat there for a few hours without any thoughts, just waiting and watching the few Core patrols that came through. Then he started moving.

A/N – This 500 word limit might kill any active readers I have. That's a brutal way to end it. I'll try and get the next part up a lot faster than this one, but no promises since I'm in an intensive class right now and the final is quickly approaching. After that I should have more time. And then I'll start editing too, which will make the 500 word limit more worth it.


End file.
